


i don't care where you been, how many miles, i still love you

by tazure



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter/Funhaus RPF
Genre: Dissociation, FAHC, Fake AH Crew, GTA AU, Gunshot Wounds, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, its like a murder mystery except terrible, pov is in a fucked up headspace, unreality, what are the kids tagging it these days
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-08
Updated: 2016-06-08
Packaged: 2018-07-13 02:22:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7134716
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tazure/pseuds/tazure
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The crew puts itself back together after tragedy. Some of them find it easier than others.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i don't care where you been, how many miles, i still love you

**Author's Note:**

> SLAMS SONG LYRICS IN TITLE AT 1AM
> 
> im really tired of looking at this
> 
> pov is Fucked Up so if unreality/dissociation bothers you, beware. its not necessarily a downer but the archive warnings aren't there for my health.
> 
> anyway there's no real graphic violence/gore but people do get shot with guns and whatever.

It’s too dark to see his hands.

He scrubs them until they’re raw, until he can’t tell whether the blood seeping into the lines around his knuckles is his or not, blistering his skin where it runs. He doesn’t notice when his eyes adjust to the dark, just enough to make out the unnatural shine of the mirror in front of him, reflecting off the light seeping through the cracks around the door.

There’s a man watching him from inside it, with bleached hair and tan skin and a grin that stretches grotesquely from ear to ear, lips chapped and red and teeth too white.

He reaches out and finds the tap, turns off the water. In the silence after it, he can hear breathing, rough and desperate, echoing off the tile. The air is too thick, his shirt too tight. He fumbles with his collar and the buttons baffle him, until he tugs hard and they go flying, quiet _pings_ where the strike tile and porcelain. Chest free, the air comes easier, the breathing starts to sound less frantic.

He reaches out and finds the sink in the dark, holds it like letting go might leave him floating. The cold seeps into him, cools the fire in his skin, lets him think for a moment.

There’s still a bitter taste of iron in his mouth. He spits into the sink, tongue probing around in his mouth until it finds the raw gap between his teeth. He gags, half from pain and half from the taste.

It’s a few minutes before he gets control of himself again. Nothing comes up. His stomach is empty by now.

His hands are shaking where they’re gripping the sink. His breath his still coming in rough, shaky gasps, like his throat is threatening to close up. He closes his eyes and tries to ground himself, and when he opens them again it’s raining.

There’s blood on his hands and on his shirt and in his hair, blood and worse, all running slick with the water pooling up in his palms, turning the ground soft so when his knees hit he hardly feels it,

He pounds his head with his fists, feels the cold tile under his bare feet. He presses the heels of his hands to his eyes and tries to focus. Rain pelts his back, cutting through his thin shirt and piercing at his skin. It wasn’t supposed to rain today, he’s not dressed for the rain. He reaches up and tosses his aviators into the mud like an effigy.

He pulls his hands away, feels the blood trickling down his chin, and reaches out blindly for the edge of the tub.

The water is cold. He turns the knob until the water burns his skin. Someone grabs his arm, tight enough to bruise, whips him around hard enough that he stumbles. He runs his fingers through his hair, working out the gel and gore holding it up. Trees are creaking around them, threatening to uproot if the wind gets worse.

It’s a long time before he moves again. He turns the water off, lets the excess drip off him as he shakes out his hair.

He steps out of the shower, still dripping, and reaches out until he finds a towel hanging on the wall. He ties it around his waist as his feet find the rug and he digs his toes into it, relishing the sensation of mud on his bare feet. For a moment he stares into the mirror, at the man grinning back at him, hair plastered down and bare chest dripping, and reaches out for the light switch.

The man is less intimidating in the light. His bleach-blond hair is sticking limply to his face, his wide eyes are dull and gone, miles away. He runs a hand vigorously through the wet hair, until the mirror is spotted with droplets. Hair coiffed by the water, the man in the mirror begins to look familiar.

Gavin grins at his reflection. The smile slides into place, arrogant, playful. His glasses are still lying in the mud and without them he’s not quite right, eyes too empty, gray instead of green, but it’s a nearly perfect replica.

“Gavin,” a voice calls. He reaches for the door and pauses, hand on the doorknob, listening. He can’t hear anything over the sound of wind.

He opens the door. Jeremy looks up at him, seems to deflate in relief and then tense up again at the sight of him.

“Hey,” he says, cheeks turning red as he looks away. “Geoff sent me to see if you were ready.”

“Nearly,” Gavin assures him. His voice sounds odd to him, half-laughing, filling the room with an echo. Jeremy nods at the carpet at Gavin steps past him.

The clothes he finds in the closet are familiar, pressed buttoned shirts and skinny jeans and Converse sneakers. He doesn’t hesitate to change, dropping the wet towel to the floor. When he looks up, he’s alone.

He pulls on a clean shirt, working the buttons from the bottom up, fingers numb from the wind.

“Gavin!”

“Yeah?” he asks. He straightens his sleeves and looks at the empty room one last time, through the curtains drawn over the sunlit window and out into the warm afternoon air.

He leaves the room feeling half-naked without his aviators. Part of him wants to reach down, rescue them from the dirt, but he can’t bring himself to do it.

The Golden Boy is dead.

Geoff is waiting for him outside, in front of his apartment, as promised. He’s leaning up against a too-familiar black car and for a moment Gavin stops walking, throat tight. Geoff is muttering into his phone, but Jeremy has caught sight of him and waves him over urgently.

Geoff looks up as Gavin approaches, ends his phone call abruptly with a half-mumbled apology. His smile is painful to look at, and Gavin doesn’t bother to return in kind.

“Are you sure about this?” Jeremy asks, muttering to Geoff like he thinks Gavin can’t hear him. Geoff doesn’t even acknowledge him, brushes past him to usher Gavin into the car. Gavin shoots Jeremy a sympathetic look as Geoff makes his way around the car to the driver’s side.

“Don’t take it personally.” he tells him quietly. Jeremy looks somewhat comforted as Gavin slips into the car.

_“Hey,”_

_Michael is sitting in the driver’s seat. He turns to flash Gavin a grin as he slips into the passenger seat next to him._

_Gavin shoots him a thumbs up, adjusting the aviators on his face. It’s sunset now, and the sky is a scorched red, too bright to comfortably see, but the inside of the car is shaded and cool. There’s a hint of rain on the horizon, just out of sight._

Geoff slips into the empty driver’s seat and starts he car. The silence is thick enough to cut, and Gavin opts for staring out the tinted window, as Jeremy slips away behind them.

The day is just as hot as the one before. Traffic is sluggish, the air condition stale and uncomfortably cold in the car, circulating dead air around.

_“We’re just up ahead,” Michael says, and glances at him. Gavin swivels around and Jeremy grins nervously at him from the back seat, one corner of his mouth up higher than the other, making him look crooked._

_“First heist, Lil’ J?” he asks playfully. Jeremy ducks his head._

_“Just nervous.” he says, almost too honestly. Michael takes them around a sharp curve, tires skidding on summer-dried asphalt, and Gavin leans back in his seat to keep from slamming his face into the headrest._

_“You’ll do fine.” Michael says dismissively. Gavin turns his head to look at him, narrow eyes squinting against the sunset, lips turned down._

_“It’s a bit weird, innit?” Gavin asks. “To be doing this again, without Ray?”_

_Michael snorts and jerks his shoulders, like it’s irrelevant, like it’s pointless to talk about. His knuckles are white on the steering wheel. “Bit stupid to be out here without a fucking sniper, yeah.”_

_“Ryan’s on it.” Gavin says dismissively, and pivots in his seat again. “’sides, we got Jeremy now. I reckon this’ll be the best heist yet.”_

The car slams to a stop and Gavin has to catch himself before his nose hits the dashboard. Geoff twists the keys in the ignition and sits for a moment, hands still on the wheel, staring out through the windshield, like he’s bracing himself.

The ocean looms up ahead of them. In the distance, bobbing against the current, he can see the sails of boats on the water, white on blue-gray.

_“It’s the perfect getaway,” Geoff is saying, unrolling a crumpled picture for them to look at. Michael whistles in appreciation._

_“What do we do with it?” Jeremy asks, blankly, looking at the picture. Geoff makes a disparaging noise and gestures at all of them with his crinkled magazine clipping._

_“We ride it.” he says viciously, and then grins wide. “Into the fucking sunset, boys.”_

“Gav!”

Gavin turns away from the window. Geoff is leaning in through the driver’s side door, watching him carefully. Gavin realizes he’s been calling his name for a while now.

“Yeah?”

Geoff stares at him for a long minute, and then nods, leaving the door open behind him as he walks away.

Gavin stares out through the windshield and breathes in greedily. There’s sharp ocean air coming in through the open door, the roar of water beating on rock nearby.

_“You’re not gonna leave those on, are you?”_

_Gavin stops fiddling with his aviators and turns around, surprised. Jeremy turns a little red, like he’s suddenly worried Gavin will take it personally._

_“’s wrong with ‘em?”_

_“Well you’re meant to look upscale, aren’t you?” he asks. Michael snickers as Gavin feels his glasses self-consciously._

_“They don’t look posh?” he asks._

_“No!” Michael yells at him, laughing properly now. They take another turn too fast and Gavin grabs his seat to stop his skull smashing against the window._

_“You’re right,” he agrees after a moment. The effort of lifting them up is more than he expected, like he’s peeling away part of his identity. He leans over the back of his seat and Jeremy stiffens as he carefully hooks them around his ears. “You hang on to these for me.”_

_“What?” Jeremy asks. His surprise is half-hidden by the shades, and for a moment Gavin laments the loss of his mask, but he can’t help but grin at the look Jeremy gives him._

_“They fit your getup better,” he says, taking in the effect fully. Jeremy is dressed in business casual, black blazer and pale blue button-up. The gold rims are a little overkill, but they make him look serious, professional, everything they aren’t on Gavin. “You look good.”_

_He meant it as a satisfaction with his outfit, his costume, but Jeremy flushes red. Gavin can’t be bothered to be more specific._

The door opens and Gavin nearly falls out of it, the way he’s leaning against it. The seatbelt keeps him from spilling out onto the sandy asphalt, and he scrambles to straighten up and unclip it.

Michael is watching him, face unreadable. Gavin grins at him emptily.

“Hey, Boi.” he says cheerily. Michael steps out of the way to give him room to get out. It takes him a moment to find his footing.

They’re only a few steps away from the docks, fields of empty boats bobbing in the water. He looks at Michael.

“Where are we going?” he asks, for the first time. Michael shuts the door behind him and turns away. Leads him up onto the dock and toward the ocean. Geoff is nowhere to be found, but when Gavin turns back, the black car is gone. The rest of the docks are empty, silent but for the water slapping against the rotting wood.

He’s alone with Michael.

_“Gavin and Michael,” Geoff says, pointing at them in turn and then back down at the blueprints, “are phase one.”_

_“Team Nice Dynamite.” Gavin says, and Michael him so hard on the back his eyes water. He’s grinning, eyes all lit up. It’s the first time they’ve worked a job together since Ray left._

_Geoff draws circles on the blueprints with his finger, drawing their attention again._

_“Here’s the front door – probably gonna be heavy security here. We’ve got passes for the two of you.”_

_“Got it.” Gavin says, nodding._

_The whole crew is leaning in, watching Geoff draw invisible shapes on the blueprints. There’s an excited tension between them. Across the table, Jeremy is watching with rapt attention, as if afraid to miss anything. Gavin knows they’ll go over this again – and again, and again – until all of them are sick to death of it, until Michael is muttering Geoff’s words to himself under his breath like a mantra, and Ryan is interrupting to finish sentences for him. But he was nervous too, the first time Geoff pulled out a map of the city and told him what his job was._

_“Michael,” Geoff says, tapping the blueprints, and Michael leans in, knuckles on the table as he studies the blueprints with Geoff, “you split off from Gav, keep your eye on him for the signal-“_

_“What’s the signal?” Gavin asks immediately_.

_“Whatever – blow him a kiss, I don’t care. Just do something to get his attention.” Geoff says, irritated. “Something subtle.”_

They’re at the edge of the dock now. Michael stops, looks out at the water for a long time, hands clenched in the pockets of his jacket. Gavin wonders if he should feel suspicious, and if it were anyone else he might be. But he hasn’t got enough left in him to mistrust Michael. Maybe it’s loyalty, or love, or just plain stupidity. Michael swings down off the dock and into the two-seater motorboat tied down next to them, and Gavin just watches him fuss with the motor for a minute, wondering if Michael would stop him if he left now. Part of him doesn’t think so.

He gets in, eventually, taking the seat next to Michael without a word from either of them. Michael manages to get the engine started, and the roar is loud enough that they couldn’t talk even if either of them were so inclined.

_He reaches out across the table, points out a flaw in their security, it’s minor, it’s fixable, but Jeremy is reaching out at the same time. Their hands collide, gently, his fingers brushing over Jeremy’s knuckles, and Jeremy jerks back._

_“Sorry,” he says, immediately. Gavin looks up at him to ask if there’s something he wants to say, to ask, knows how intimidated he is being here with all of them, but Jeremy looks away before Gavin can catch his eyes._

Their destination is another boat – a ship, properly, looming like a shadow above their tiny speedboat in the dark. The sun is setting by the time they pull up, red stains coloring the water when Jack meets them to pull them in and tie them off.

“Didn’t really earn this, did we?” Gavin says as Jack helps him up. Michael is already gone, vanished into the bowels of the ship before Gavin can even catch his balance. Jack smiles weakly at him.

“We pulled it off,” he says quietly, like he’s trying to convince himself.

“I guess.” Gavin tells him, and brushes past him to follow Michael.

_Geoff isn’t here._

_Gavin lands in the hot tub and makes sure the shockwave hits all of them. When he surfaces, sputtering, everyone is laughing, wiping water out of their eyes. Michael pushes him, the momentum ebbed by the water, until he falls into a seat limply._

_“Idiot” Michael huffs, affectionately. Jack offers him a glass half-full of champagne, already fogged from the heat of the water, and Gavin drains it immediately._

_Geoff isn’t here to enjoy it, but the ship is a gift to the crew, anyway. A love letter written in gold-plated railings, sitting on the bay just out of sight of the shore._

_“When’s Geoff getting back in?” Jeremy asks, almost nervously, like he doesn’t want to be caught out of odds with the rest of them if Geoff is actually mad._

_“Tomorrow.” Jack assures him, pouring himself another glass._

_“Chill out, Lil’ J.” Gavin says lazily, setting his glass aside and leaning back, letting the heat work out the tension in his muscles. The sun is setting, casting a soft red glow over everything, making it feel surreal and at ease, like a fairy tale._

_Jeremy inadvertently splashes Michael and Michael responds with a declaration of war, starting a wrestling match that outlasts Jack, who leaves, yawning, when the sun finally goes down._

_Jeremy gives in when Michael shoves him underwater, waving a hand above the surface in lieu of a white flag. He comes up laughing, breathless, knocking Michael off him, and follows Jack inside, claiming to be sick of the water._

_Michael gets a few rounds of roughhousing out of Gavin before he leaves too, complaining about pruned fingers. The stars are out by the time the door shuts behind him, leaving the deck silent but for the soft splash of water on the edges of the tub, and, distantly, on the sides of the ship._

_Hands brush his knees under the water, fingertips hesitating on the inside of his thigh._

Someone is knocking at his door, quietly but insistently, a subtle tapping amid the creaking of the ship.

He sits up, disoriented. It’s dark, the tiny window across the room stained with salt streaks and growing gently in the starlight. Something moves and he jumps, slams his head into the wall, and Jeremy hurriedly steps closer in concern.

“Sorry!” he whispers, pulling back as Gavin curses quietly and rubs his temple.

“What is it?” he demands. Jeremy bites his lip.

“Geoff won’t talk to me,” he admits, finally, and when he glances at the bed Gavin shifts to make room for him. Jeremy sits next to him, staring hard at the ground.

“Geoff upset.” Gavin says, reluctantly. He wants to tell Jeremy off, to make him leave so they don’t have to talk about this, but Jeremy looks up at him with wide eyes reflecting off the starlight from outside before he can say it.

“You’re my friend, right, Gav?” he asks.

“Yeah,” Gavin answers, baffled. “Yeah, ‘course.”

He waits for Jeremy to say something else, to look away, but he doesn’t. Gavin is the one that breaks away, standing up to look through the window.

He can’t tell how late it is, but the sun is gone, moon lighting up the water around them. The sight through the porthole window is shifting enough to make him sick.

“Do you think he meant to do it?” Jeremy asks.

_Cold hands on cold metal, his hands aren’t shaking, his hands never shake._

“Yes.” Gavin says. He hears Jeremy’s breath catch behind him.

When he turns back around, the room is empty.

_“Jeremy,” Geoff says, and Jeremy looks up, makes eye contact with Geoff, face serious. Geoff points to the blueprints again, a spot near the back of the building. “You’re our inside man.”_

_Jeremy nods, watching Geoff trace a box along the paper._

_“You come in from the back, I got a guy planted already, he’ll back you up. You’re here to reinforce the guard around our spot.”_

_“The world’s shortest security officer.” Jeremy says seriously, and there’s a collective snort of laughter around the table._

Gavin unlocks the door. The interior of the ship is dark, doors all closed and locked. He makes his way up to the desk, eager to breathe fresh air again.

Someone is already here, standing at the bow of the ship, facing the water, outlined in moonlight. For a moment, he considers slipping back below, but the idea of suffocating in his room is too much to bear.

The door makes a sound as it closes behind him, makes Michael turn to look.

“Just up for some air,” Gavin mutters. He turns away, makes for the other side of the ship, but Michael is still watching him, eyes boring into the back of his skull, like he expects something from him, like he expected more from him.

“Do you think he meant to do it?” he blurts out, because he can’t stand the silence, the staring, echoing Jeremy’s question. Michael turns away, finally, staring out at the water like the answer is there.

“No.” he says, finally.

_Michael is two steps ahead of him, flashing his invitation to the guard at the door. Gavin follows in style, grinning at the man as he squints down at him, eyes flickering between the black and white photograph Gavin is holding up on his forged ID and his beaming face._

_He gets by without incident._

_Michael is already halfway across the convention floor, but he turns back and takes moment to make eye contact with Gavin, just a split second, before his eyes carry on past. Gavin turns to the booth to his right._

_It’s sparse, almost pathetic, in his own humble opinion. A crusty-looking emerald sits in a plastic case as a poor excuse for a centerpiece, surrounded by gold trinkets that would look more at home in a mall kiosk than here. He skims the table over, bored already, and looks out into the sea of displays and patrons for something else._

_He’s not about to be caught dead stealing something this paltry._

He makes his way to the other side of the ship, past the helipad and towards the far railing, looking down at the water churning against the metal under him.

He wonders how long it would take for that water to work its way through, how long they would have to stay here, unmoving, until the waves broke in.

_“Steal something.” Geoff says. “Steal anything, whatever, it doesn’t matter.”_

_“Anything?” Gavin asks, scanning the blueprints. Geoff taps on the doorway, outlined in red._

_“Something near the front, here. Doesn’t matter. Just get caught.” Geoff points at him, eyebrows pulled down like they get when he’s expecting trouble. “I mean it, no shitting around. You go in, you pick a table, and you get caught. No stealing anything else. Got it?”_

_Gavin shrugs, feeling stifled. “Whatever, got it.”_

_“I mean it-”_

_“I got it, Geoff.” Gavin insists. “Get on with it.”_

_“Make sure me and Jack are in place first, then send the signal to Michael.” Geoff says, gesturing at both men in turn. “Once you’ve got their attention, Michael’s gonna open fire.”_

_“Excellent.” Michael says, grinning. He nods at Gavin approvingly. “So you pretend to fuck up and I pretend to save your sorry ass. Shouldn’t be hard to make that look convincing.”_

Gavin grabs the railing hard, feels the cold metal under his fingers, salt spray in his hair. Steadies himself. His eyes are burning from the spray and the wind, his shirt is sticking to him wetly.

_“Gavin,”_

_He doesn’t remember what he’s supposed to say, what he’s supposed to do here. The story is getting muddled up in his brain._

_Someone is grabbing his wrist, pulling_ him back into the moment.

Jeremy is watching him, worried, eyebrows creased together.

“I came up for some air,” he says, uncertainly, like he needs an excuse to be here. He takes a breath and tries to steady himself.

 _Michael is across the room –_ no – _Geoff is gesturing to the paper, insistently, telling him_ – no – _Ryan is looking up at him with his face paint smeared by the rain_ –

“No,” Gavin gasps. Jeremy is grabbing him by the arm, shaking him gently, trying to get him to focus.

“Gav, look at me,” he says, voice tight, “Gavin!”

 _The deck is swaying gently_.

“I’m okay,” he says, trying to root himself in the sensation of Jeremy’s fingers too-tight on his wrists “I’m just…tired. Nothing seems real.”

“I’m real.” He says firmly. Gavin nods.

They stand like that for a while, Gavin holding on like if he lets go he’ll be lost again. Gavin can’t help but notice how the moonlight makes Jeremy look washed out and pale. He thinks about how young Jeremy really is, how much a few years can mean in this business. Thinks about where he was when he was as young.

Jeremy is watching him closely, eyebrows crumpled together with concern.

“I’m going to bed,” he says, finally. Jeremy looks uncertain, like he should protest, or follow, but Gavin is exhausted and heavy, wants to sleep until the world makes sense again.

“Yeah,” Jeremy says, finally, and lets go. Gavin smiles at him as he goes, leaves him standing alone on the deck, drenched in starlight.

_The water is warm around him, making him relaxed and giddy even as the winds pick up and the deck gets colder._

_Hot hands find his hips, fingers digging in. He feels something tug at his trunks and pushes up into the pressure, moaning into wet skin, hot enough that steam is rising from both of them. He tangles his fingers in long hair and reels back to kiss neck, jaw, chin, mouth, teeth pulling at chapped lips until he hears a groan._

_Something whispers to him at the back of his mind that they aren’t alone, that someone could see, but he ignores it, too caught up in the way the water is swirling around their hips, lazy eddies that make his skin tingle at the contrast, arms cold and feet scorched._

_Strong arms insist, pulling him out of the tub without breaking the kiss. It’s a stumbling mess, they pull apart to laugh, quiet, breathless, exhilarated by the secrecy, taking turns devouring each other’s skin. Blisters pop up under hot lips along his collarbone, soaking into him, until there’s suddenly a bed underneath him, and god help him he doesn’t even know if it’s his or not, doesn’t care as molten fingers melt into his waistband._

“Ryan,” he gasps.

The room is empty. He sits up, blankets falling off him, feels the bruises under his shirt that are still pale yellow, spotting his collarbone, his wrists.

Distantly, he hears the echo of his name, whispered into his ear.

The sun is up. He throws the blankets aside and combs through his hair with his fingers. The salt has left it sticky, stiff. He wants a shower. He wants a bed that doesn’t move all night.

He nearly slams into Jeremy in the hallway, reels back until his shoulder catches the door.

“Hey!” Jeremy says, startled, and then looks away suddenly.

“Hey,” Gavin says, more subdued. He isn’t sure how long he slept – eight, ten, twelve hours? His head is throbbing, distantly, a subtle pounding in his temples. He feels like he hasn’t eaten in years.

“Geoff waiting for us on deck.” Jeremy tells the ugly red carpet under them. “To talk about our next move.”

“Top, alright.” Gavin says, and then reaches out as Jeremy turns to leave. “Hey – thanks. For last night.”

“Yeah.” Jeremy says, smiling a little. He meets his eyes again. “Feeling better?”

“Yeah.” Gavin says, feeling the blisters along his collarbone with his fingers. “Just needed some time to get my head on straight.”

“You can trust me to tell you what’s real or not.” Jeremy promises, and leads the way up to the deck.

Outside it’s bright, overcast. Gavin reaches up to pull his sunglasses on and stops himself in time, pushing his fingers through his hair instead. Geoff is in the middle of saying something, looks up, surprised, when they appear on deck.

“’Morning.” Jack says, cutting forcefully through the silence. He smiles warmly at Gavin, pats his shoulder as he comes to stand next to them. “How’re you feeling?”

“Fine.” he says.

Geoff is watching him from across the table, Michael is looking determinedly elsewhere.

“What’re we doing, Geoff?” Michael asks. There’s a heavy edge to his voice, something that implies the question goes further than their plans for the moment. Geoff sighs.

“The plan was to stop for supplies farther south.” He says, looking down at the naval map he’s got spread out in front of him. There’s pencil lines running north to south on it, all along the coastline. “I don’t see any reason not to go along with that.”

“Really?” Michael asks caustically. “Not a single reason?”

“Michael,” Jeremy says, but Michael ignores him, busy glaring at Geoff.

“So what’s your plan, Michael?” Geoff asks, leaning across the table towards him. Michael uncrosses his arms in disbelief.

“My _plan?_ ” he demands, incredulous. “I want my fucking cut, that’s my plan. You think I’m sticking around for something else?”

There’s a heavy silence after his words.

“You’re quitting the crew?” Geoff’s voice is angry, he’s rigid, threatening, but there’s a breaking point just behind his voice that the rest of them can hear.

Michael laughs, coldly, hysterically, and waves an arm around the table, gesturing to all of them. “ _Quitting?_ What’s there left to _quit_?”

“Michael,” Jack says, trying to stem the argument before it gets worse.

“What’s fucking left?” Michael demands, looking at the rest of them when Geoff doesn’t answer. “What are we even doing here?”

“If you want your money you can fucking have it.” Geoff says viciously, avoiding the question. He reaches into his shirt pulls something out, glittering and heavy in his hand, throws it down on the table. “Take it! If this is all you want out of us, fine! Go ahead!”

The brooch is a silky white gold, embossed with shades of rose and silver and yellow, folded up together neatly, lines so tight they seem solid, even under scrutiny.

_Michael looks up from the photograph and raises his eyebrows at Geoff doubtfully._

_“This is it?” he asks, and hands the picture off to Gavin, visibly unimpressed._

_“That little pin is worth more than your life.” Geoff says seriously. Gavin squints at it suspiciously, turning the page back and forth, like maybe the real value will come up in the right angle._

_“Looks like something my grandma wears,” Jeremy comments._

_“The setting is irrelevant,” Geoff says dismissively, reaching out for the photograph again, “it’s the rock that matters.”_

In the sunlight, the gemstone looks nearly liquid, clear as glass and a bright, bloody red. Michael is looking down at it like he wants to throw up at the sight of it.

Nobody moves. The motion of the ship rocks the brooch back and forth, sends droplets of red scattering across the table around it.

“We just need some time to breathe.” Jack says, finally. He scoops the brooch off the table again, tucking it away out of sight, and there’s a visible deflating, as if the very presence of the thing is toxic to them.

“Yeah,” Michael says, and then shakes himself, like he’s trying break the spell the ruby has over them. “Away from each other.”

“That’s what this crew is for.” Geoff protests, looking up from the space the brooch used to be. “We support each other.”

“We kill each other.” Michael says. It isn’t harsh, angry. He says it like a fact, tiredly, resignedly.

The silence that follows is broken only by the sound of waves breaking gently on the ship’s sides. Gavin reaches up for his aviators and finds them missing.

“Things happen,” Geoff says, but his voice is wavering now.

“Things happen?” Michael repeats, pushing through the breaking point until Geoff’s face goes cold. “Things didn’t just happen, Geoff, some of us made them happen.”

“Come on,” Jeremy protests, weakly, looking to Jack for help, but Jack is busy staring at Geoff. Overhead, clouds are gathering, threatening rain.

“You’re really not going to do anything about it?” Michael asks, fists clenched at his sides, shaking, with anger or something else, Gavin doesn’t know.

“What do you want me to do?” Geoff shoots back. _Cold hands, cold metal_.

“I want you to act like a fucking leader, for once.”

_Michael’s hands are on his arm, his voice is in his ear, hot, humid through the rain._

“I’m trying to keep this fucking crew together!”

 _His face is wet and he doesn’t know if it’s from tears or rain or both_ ,

“What crew?”

_His fingers won’t bend, they’re too cold, too stiff, the rain is seeping into gaps in the metal, he isn’t even sure it’ll fire,_

“We’re still fucking here, aren’t we?”

_He wants a sign, wants validation, wants to know this is the right thing to do,_

“Some of us!”

 _Ryan is on his knees, eyes bloodshot, mouth moving. Gavin can’t hear him over the rain, can’t hear him over Michael yelling, doesn’t care what he has to say. Gunshots, gunshots, gunshots,_ gunshots,

Michael is staring at the gun in his hand like even he isn’t sure how it got there. For a moment it’s like a photograph, all of them frozen in shock,

Geoff falls and Jack goes after him, screaming something at Michael,

_When he fires Michael yells, drops down to the ground like he can help, like he should help, hands clutching at Ryan’s collar, his jacket, shaking him,_

Jeremy’s fingers are digging into his wrist and he pushes him off, runs his fingers through his hair, pulls until brittle bleach-blond strands come away in his hands, tries to find something stable,

Michael flinches away from the pistol in his hand like it’s burned him,

_Gavin turns away, reaches up to wipe the blood off his glasses and only makes it worse, rips them off his face and throws them down in the mud at Ryan’s feet, feels Michael’s hand on his elbow, shaking him, fingernails digging in through his shirt,_

Michael turns away from the scene and runs, emptyhanded,

“I’m fine,” Geoff says,

“You’re not fine, Geoff,” Jack tells him viciously, looking down at the blood seeping up between his fingers as he presses down on Geoff’s shoulder,

Gavin looks on distantly, like he’s miles away.

_“What if it was me?” Gavin asks, voice tight. Michael doesn’t look at him, but his fingers go tight around the wheel in front of him. “What if it was me that left?”_

_“What if it was?” Michael snaps at him venomously. He jerks the wheel so hard the car lifts up on two wheels for a few seconds._

_“What would you do?”_

_Michael does look at him then, with eyes rimmed red, and Gavin thinks on all the times he’s seen Michael and Ray together, heads bowed together, fingers brushing shyly. The moment drags on and he looks ahead nervously, at the dark streets passing them by, and wishes Michael would look at the road again._

_“The crew is what’s important.” he says bitterly, and looks away at last. Gavin clutches at the edge of his seat as they take another turn too fast. “We’re nothing without it.”_

_“You don’t think that.” Gavin says quietly. Michael wipes his nose angrily._

_“He told me, you know,” he says. There’s an edge to his voice that makes Gavin nervous. “a few weeks ago. He talked about leaving.”_

_Gavin doesn’t know what to say. Part of him isn’t surprised. Ray and Michael have always been closer to each other than the rest of him, but he can’t help but be hurt that Ray didn’t tell him too. That Michael wouldn’t tell him._

_“I told him he was an idiot.” Michael says. His knuckles are white. “I told him not to leave.”_

_“What did he say?” Gavin asks quietly._

_“He asked me to come.” Michael tells him. Gavin stares ahead, through the dark windshield._

_“What did you say?” he asks, tentatively, afraid of the answer. Michael laughs, and Gavin thinks how much he doesn’t like the sound. How much he misses Michael’s old laugh._

_“I’m still fucking here, aren’t I?” he says, half-hysterical. He glances at Gavin and his red eyes go cold again. “If I didn’t go with him, what the fuck makes you think I’d go after you?”_

_Gavin doesn’t say anything. Michael turns back to the road, silent, but he seems a little calmer now. They take a turn on all four wheels._

_“You know what, though?” Gavin says, tentatively, when the silence has stretched on too long. Michael doesn’t answer, and he presses on regardless. “I’d choose you. Over the crew.”_

He turns away from the scene in front of him, follows Michael downstairs. He doesn’t have to go far. Michael has collapsed in the hallway, arms wrapped around his knees, face buried. He looks up when Gavin lets the door slam behind him, carried by the ocean wind.

For a moment there’s a look of such intense hatred on his face that Gavin thinks he blames him for this, too. But then it’s gone, replaced with misery and guilt and something else Gavin can’t really touch, and Michael looks away before he can decipher it any more.

“Guess we’re both murderers now.” Michael says quietly. Gavin reaches the foot of the stairs and stops there, looking down at Michael sitting on the floor in front of him.

“We always were.” Gavin says stiffly. He kneels down and sits next to Michael, leaning back against the wall, head spinning as the ship rocks. He hears the door open and knows without looking that Jeremy has followed them inside.

“It’s just a nick,” Jeremy tells them. Michael doesn’t even acknowledge him. Gavin nudges him with his shoulder.

“Geoff will be fine.” he says. Michael snorts. Jeremy is frozen at the top of the stairs, trapped in the fissure opening between them. Gavin decides to ignore him too.

“None of this would have happened if Ray didn’t leave.” Michael says finally, mumbling into his sleeve. Gavin’s throat tightens.

“Something would have happened anyway,”

“If Ray never left Jeremy wouldn’t have been here.” Michael interrupts. His voice is hardly more than a rough whisper, but it cuts through Gavin like he’s yelling it. “Jeremy wouldn’t have had a stupid fucking crush on you in the first place,”

“Stop,” Gavin tells him, pleading. Michael turns around to look at him.

“Neither of us trusted him, you were right-“

“Michael,” Gavin says, and something in his voice or his face must stop him. _They’re sitting in the car and Michael glances at him, catches his eyes through the aviators for just a second as he mutters the plan to himself one last time, hesitates as he walks over Ryan’s name._

“Do you really think he meant to?” Michael asks him, and his voice is so raw Gavin has to look away.

“Gavin,” Jeremy calls from the door uncertainly, _clutching the back of his shirt as the flashbang goes off. Gavin shuts his eyes in time but the noise cuts through him and leaves him deaf, blinking through the haze, unsteady, until Geoff grabs his arm and pulls him, through the mess and gore and smoke and outside,_

Michael grabs his hand, tries to pull him back to the present,

_Gunfire and rain pelt the sidewalk around him, Geoff pulling him by his arm until something rips him free, hard enough to leave bruises printed on his wrist, has him spinning back around to see Jeremy’s face behind him,_

_His ears are still plugged, the bullet cuts through Jeremy’s skull like tissue, spills him out on the ground, the first thing he hears is Ryan screaming in his earpiece as Geoff bundles him forward,_

“Do you really think he loved you that much?” Michael asks, his voice so quiet Gavin can hardly hear him over the ringing in his ears.

 _Ryan’s hands are hot on his bare shoulders, hips pressed together, and when Gavin asks what he’d do to keep him Ryan leans in and whispers_ “Anything,”

“It doesn’t matter,” Gavin whispers. “They’re dead anyway, it doesn’t matter.”

“It does matter.” Michael says, voice breaking.

“What if it had been you?” Gavin asks. Michael looks away.

“It wouldn’t be any different.” Michael says, but he’s lying. Gavin bites his lip.

“You hate me.” he whispers.

“I don’t.” Michael lies.

“You blame me.” he says. “For everything.”

“No.” He digs his nails into Gavin’s palm, makes him feel it, how real and solid and human he is, makes him feel the way his hands are trembling hard. “I can’t lose you too.”

It’s not a lie. Gavin’s mouth is cotton and he can’t swallow, tries and fails and nearly chokes, and Michael leans in to press his forehead to Gavin’s. “Please,” he says, hoarsely.

“Jeremy is dead.” Gavin says, like it’s the weather, like the words are just words and don’t mean anything. “Ryan is dead.”

“I know.” Michael says. “Maybe Geoff is dead too.”

“I had to do something,” Gavin says, desperately, “nobody was going to _do_ anything, he wasn’t…”

“It wasn’t going to fix it.” Michael tells him. There’s blood on their hands where Michael’s fingernails have dug too deep, but Gavin can barely feel it. “It’s only made it worse.”

“I had to do something,” he insists.

“I know.” Michael says. “So did I.”

There’s a moment of silence, while Michael stares at the ground and Gavin stares at Michael, and blood trickles down Gavin’s fingers.

“You hate me.” he says.

“I can’t _lose_ you.” Michael corrects. He lets go, finally, and Gavin looks at the divots in his skin. “I don’t know…” His voice gives out and he tries again. “I don’t know if there’s a crew left to…” He takes a breath. “I don’t want to leave you behind too.”

“You were right.” Gavin says. “There’s no more crew to leave behind.”

Michael’s lips are tight, a thin line on his face.

Above them, at the top of the stairs, miles away, the door opens. Gavin sees the gun before he registers Geoff’s face and realizes he couldn’t do anything even if he wanted to.

Geoff tosses the pistol down the steps, and next to him Michael flinches at the sound. It clatters harmlessly at his feet.

“If you ever fucking shoot me again,” Geoff says, reaching out to grab at the railing shakily, “I won’t give it back.”

Neither of them say a word as Geoff stumbles down the steps, face pale. Jack follows close behind him, hands out to catch Geoff if the tilt of the ship throws him off-balance.

But Geoff makes it down without any help, and immediately swats Jack’s hands away when he reaches out to steady him anyway. He slams his back into the wall opposite the one Michael and Gavin are huddled against and slides down it, until he’s sprawled on the floor across the hallway.

“So,” he says, and Jack sits down next to him. “How do we feel about Tijuana?”

From the look on Jack’s face, he wasn’t expecting it any more than Gavin was. Michael goes stiff next to him, opens his mouth to say something and manages to get nothing out. Geoff presses a hand to his bloodstained shoulder.

“You leave this crew in a body bag or not at all.” he says, and kicks Michael’s pistol towards him. “Go ahead, it’s the only way you’re making it off this stupid overpriced boat alive.”

Michael doesn’t move. Gavin does.

Geoff watches him take the loaded pistol instead, and Gavin tries to read what he sees. Mistrust? Disappointment? It’s hard to tell under the layer of stifled pain.

Gavin checks the clip. There’s five shots left.

“One for each of us,” he muses. He looks up and slips the clip back into place, “and one left over.”

Three sets of eyes are on him.

_Michael slams on the breaks finally, so hard Gavin’s seatbelt bites into his neck. When he looks up, Michael is watching him, eyes bright and electric._

_“It doesn’t fucking matter,” he says suddenly, voice so certain Gavin can’t help but believe him, “he left, he’s gone, fuck him. Fuck him. We’re still here. We’re still a fucking crew.”_

“I’ve always wanted to see Mexico.” he says.

Geoff grins at him, slaps Jack on the chest with a loud “I told you.”

Next to him, Michael reaches out and grabs his wrist, fingers layering over the bruises already turning yellow. Gavin doesn’t know, for sure, that it’s real, or what it means, or what’s going to happen to them tomorrow or the day after.

He just knows he won’t be alone to figure it out.


End file.
